February 13: Day of Ancestors
by Kaak
Summary: February thirteenth is celebrated on Dinotopia as the Day to honor Ancestors, and for those communities who have strong ties, it is an important time of gathering. Ysalane and Maypaw are remembering their own partners and family when Kaak joins them in B


**disclaimer**  
Dinotopia belongs to James Gurney, the characters herein belong to me. If you want to read more about Kaak, et al. please visit Skies of Dinotopia. I disliked the miniseries very much, and this story was actually written about four months before the miniseries. It is based on the books, and there is _nothing_ in here that acknowledges the series. 

**February 13: Day of Ancestors**

Even though the Mayan bloodline on Dinotopia had been slowly diluted more and more throughout the centuries, Kaak always knew the places to find his culture on certain special holidays throughout the years. This year, he had turned twenty, and the days were getting longer again as the second month of the year began.  
  
Altanden left one of the upper launching platforms that faced north and, using his thirty-five foot wingspan, used a thermal to glide up and past the very tallest spires of the surrounding rock formations. His nestfriend was laying on his stomach on the skybax's back, chin resting on the front cushion of the saddle.   
  
The two of them flew north-westerly, Altanden taking his time and playing with a passing archaeoptryx, then gliding in circles over a large field, while Kaak waved to the two boys, obviously envious, who looked up from their planting work below. Finally, as the sun rose higher in the sky, the skybax carried his rider over the foothills of the Forbidden Mountains and into RockyPass.  
  
- 

Ysalane, an elderly woman of almost a hundred and twenty years, sat on one of the beautifully hand-crafted benches below the skybax roost, gazing skyward with an expectant expression on her face. At the same moment, an obviously pregnant Styracosaurus was meandering down Bent Root's main road. When she saw the woman sitting there, her eyes focused on the clouds, the saurian padded towards the bench.  
  
"I've seen a few batty old trikes in my time," she remarked, looking up at the sky to try and see what held her old friend in such rapture. "But I've never seen a human look so intent on a bunch of clouds for as many hours straight as you have today."  
  
Ysalane turned to her friend with a smile. "It's not the clouds I'm looking at, Maypaw. There's one more skybax rider arriving for the festival, and I want to be the first to welcome him!"  
  
The styracosaurus looked at the elderly woman with a wide grin. "Well, they do call it the festival of the _ancestors_, and since you're practically old enough to be one.." she danced away a few steps when Ysalane waved her hand at the saurian, as if shooing away a pesky fly.   
  
"You know the skybax riders," the woman defended herself. "They're always after a fashionable entrance."  
  
"Yeah," Maypaw smiled fondly at her human friend. "Fashionably _late_ entrance. Is he the one you were bragging so proudly about this morning on the caravan here? Your great-grandson from Pteros Rookery?"  
  
Ysalane nodded proudly, and Maypaw walked slowly in front of the bench, settling carefully into the grass, mindful of her swollen belly. "You'll have to introduce me, you know. Especially now that you've called him 'fashionable'. When is he due in?"  
  
The woman looked to her left, where a sundial was placed in the middle of a garden. "An hour ago," she said. "He should be here any minute..."  
  
- 

Altanden, per the plan, let out a warning screech as he dropped down through the clouds and headed for the skybax rookery. Kaak adjusted for the change in directions and gripped the edges of his saddle, then swung himself up into the kneeling position.   
  
Whoever said skybaxes couldn't at least understand human languages had obviously never spent any time around them.  
  
-  
  
The screech snapped both Ysalane and Maypaw's attention to the sky. They could see Kaak kneeling, proudly showing off his balancing skills as his skybax glided in over the rooftops towards the landing platform above their audience's heads. As Altanden swept his wings back to brake, Kaak was already ready to jump off, ready to unsnap the saddle from his skybax's back and run for the stairs, to wrap his great grandmother in a big hug.  
  
- 

Kaak was pleased to see that his entrance had served its purpose. More than a few eyes were on him as he ran out onto the deck above where his great grandmother was sitting and climbed down the ladder as fast as his arms and legs could take him. Maypaw watched the two of them embrace from her place on the grass, leaving them to their moment alone.  
  
"It's wonderful to see you again," Ysalane said, her face radiant with her smile. She wore a colorful cloth huipil and skirt, and was happy to see her great grandson wearing his own colorful outfit underneat the jacket of of his uniform. She leaned on him lightly for balance as she introduced the two. "This is Maypaw, Kaak. Maypaw, this is the one I was telling you about. The skybax-riding daredevil."  
  
The styracosaurus held out a paw in greeting. "Breathe deep, seek peace," she said, maintaining an air of delicate dignity. "Welcome to Bent Root."  
  
Kaak smiled at her, but his face betrayed some of his concern for her condition. "It's nice to meet you, Maypaw. But.. aren't you close to laying your eggs? Should you really be out here in the hot sun without shade?"  
  
"She wanted to be here to reminisce with all of her old friends," Ysalane explained for the saurian. "There are several who are here this year that may not last another four seasons to return next time." She said it in a kindly tone, and Kaak nodded. He understood. The community was so close-knit, any deaths were hard-hitting, and therefore everyone kept a close eye on the eldest members as they aged.  
  
"So," Maypaw said conversationally into the silence. "Are your father and mother going to be joinng us?"  
  
Kaak shook his head. "No. There were abnormalities in the pollen samples for this time of year, so he has to go and re-check the data himself. And mom's too busy with the sets of eggs. Pteros is understaffed right now.. they're looking for help, but it's just the way things have worked out. Too many eggs, not enough workers to watch over them all."  
  
Maypaw chuckled at the apprentice's words. "Yes, well I'm hoping for a few good eggs myself. Should I plan on finding another Hatchery to lay in?"  
  
Ysalane shook her head in wonder. "I wouldn't be surprised if you suddenly started laying them in the middle of the Quetzalcoatl ritual tomorrow at midday."  
  
Altanden surprised everyone by suddenly, at the sound of the word, making his way awkwardly off the platform and down onto the ground, shuffling up behind Kaak and putting his beak protectively over the young man's shoulder.   
  
"It always makes me laugh," Maypaw confessed, as Altanden crooned and asked for a beak-rub. "How a people so far from here could have created a story using creatures that they never saw."  
  
Kaak shrugged. "You never know. These guys can get around." He rubbed his skybax's beak soothingly, then looked around. "All right, so I know I'm late, but I'm sure there have to be other riders around here _somewhere_. Did Ani make it this year?"  
  
"Yes, she came in about four hours before you did," Ysalane laughed at her grandson's perplexed expression. "She only had to come from Treetown, but she'll be heading back with you two tomorrow as far as Pteros, then she'll go on to Canyon City."  
  
Kaak nodded and looked around. "Do you mind if I go and look around?" he asked.  
  
"Go ahead," Maypaw said, acting hurt. "Leave us old farts behind."  
  
"Maypaw!" Ysalane burst out laughing at the choice of words her styracosaurus friend had used. "I can't believe you said that!"  
  
Kaak, laughing, tapped his skybax pointedly on the side of the neck. "I can," he informed the two women, and waved. "Come on, Altanden. We've got competitions to enter, people to beat..."  
  
"Grandson!" Ysalane raised her eyebrows pointedly, face solemn. "Have you forgotten the true purpose of our days of celebration?"  
  
"I was getting to that!" the apprentice rider protested. "Food to eat, and ancestors to honor!" Relieved to see his great grandmother's mollified expression, he waved. "Take care of yourselves, and I'll see you at the feast tonight! I love you!"  
  
And then he was gone, walking briskly off down the road, Altanden gamely following, shuffling awkwardly behind. Ysalane and Maypaw exchanged looks, and the styracosaurus stretched out on the grass. "I'm about ready for a nice swim this afternoon. What do you say?"  
  
"There's a wonderful place to relax by Silver Lake," Ysalane suggested. "Xetial always used to take me there when I was a little girl."  
  
"Your mother?" Maypaw asked, getting slowly, awkwardly to her feet. "Tell me about her. What was she like?"  
  
"Well," Ysalane put a hand on the styracosaurus' side and the two walked slowly down the path to the lake, voices trailing off into the distance.  
  
- 

As Kaak and his apprentice friends compared flying styles, talked about friends, and generally enjoyed the summer afternoon, Ysalane and Maypaw did a little reminiscing of their own.  
  
"My mother used to take me on long walks through the forest," the elderly woman remembered as she took off her shoes and sat down on the dock that ran out over the surface of Silver Lake. She let her feet soak in the cool waters as Maypaw slowly lumbered down the bank until she was mostly submerged, only her head and the upper part of her back visible. The water helped take the weight off of her paws.  
  
"We would leave our home village of Jadeite, at the foot of Volcaneum, and my mother would sit me in my chair on the back of my struthiomimus nanny, and she would take me out into the forest for a day of stories and lessons on healing plants."  
  
Maypaw stood comfortably in the mud, listening respectfully to her friend's memories. This day, of course, was for those passed on, and telling stories was a way to celebrate. Ysalane's eyes took on a far-away look as she remembered things of centuries past.  
  
"We would make up adventures," she smiled at the memory. "She would tell me stories, too. When dolphinbacks came ashore, when great disasters befell Dinotopians, but there were always heroes."  
  
"Which stories did she like best?" Maypaw asked.   
  
Ysalane smiled. "We both loved the Hatchery stories the best. It's why I went and spent my life with the hatchlings, why I raised my daughter the same way. It's no wonder, when Itzel followed a skybax rider she still made sure to be near the hatchlings."  
  
The styracosaurus mother looked up at her human friend and smiled. "Your family has the special gifts."  
  
"Yes," Ysalane laughed softly. "That's what my mother always told me."  
  
-  
  
"We would make up adventures," Ysalane continued. "She would tell me stories of times when dolphinbacks came washing up on the shore. She saw many of them throughout her lifetime, as I've seen many throughout my own. She even saw that ship that made it over the reefs intact.  
  
"I remember the first time she ever told me about that. I couldn't have been more than six or seven, and I got so wrapped up in the telling, in the way her eyes would light up with the passion of the adventure as she told me all of the thrilling events, one after the other. Her hands, always so gentle and kind with the hatchlings, seemed to take on a life of their own.  
  
"They would move rapidly in the air, sketching complicated pitcures to accompany her words. When it was over, and we were once again walking across the desert twoards Jadeite, I felt as if I'd just lived a day alongside the famous Will Denison himself, or helped a weary dolphinback up to the sand to safety with my own two hands."  
  
Ysalane trailed off, staring at her now-wrinkled hands that shook slightly without her even thinking about them. There were tears in her eyes. "Those were the best times of my life," she whispered, looking at Maypaw with a proud smile on her weathered brown face.  
  
"She was _my_ mother."  
  
Maypaw was smiling with understanding written clearly in her kind brown eyes. "She was your mother," the styracosaurus confirmed. "And she lives on, in you. I can see her in you and your daughter, and I can see her every time you pass on one of her stories."  
  
Smiling through her tears at the saurian, Ysalane shook her head in wonder at the styracosaurus' wisdom. "And you?" she asked softly. "You will be a mother, Maypaw. What will you tell your children, your hatchlings, when they ask about thei grandmother?"  
  
"I will tell them," the beautiful dinosaur confided quietly. "That they are the descendants of a proud saurian who gave her life laying eggs that would bring five young ones to the world."  
  
Ysalane watched the styracosaurus as she thought about the dinosaur's family. "And then it will be all right?" she finally suggested.  
  
"It has always been all right," Maypaw looked at Ysalane with blunt honesty. "Wherever I go on Dinotopia, and wherever my hatchlings go, there will be a family for me. People like you will spend an afternoon with me. They will share their food and I will pass on my knowledge of the legends of Dinotopia to them in return. Others first, self last. It is as it should be."  
  
The elderly human woman and her styracosaurus friend sat side-by-side in the resulting silence, each wrapped in their own thoughts of people the world had left behind.  
  
-  
  
It was getting late in the afternoon, the sun creeping off into the distance, closer and closer to the horizon, as Kaak and Ani bade their apprentice friends goodbye and took their skybaxes to the Bent Root rookery.   
  
Neither of the young skybax riders knew the two older ones, and as this was a day to spend time with those you knew, both wanted some time alone with their partners. Altanden followed Skimmer onto the landing platform and the two skybaxes waited patiently for their riders to unstrap the saddles before they wandered off to an alcove where they started discussing something in their pterosaur language, something their riders couldn't understand.  
  
-  
  
Kaak and Ani sat next to each other, legs dangling off the platform. Both still wore their apprentice uniforms, though Ani had taken off her jacket and sat wearing only her blue tank top and her workpants. Kaak let the comfortable silence reign for a few minutes, as he reflected on the day's meaning.  
  
"I wonder what it was like..." Kaak trailed off, thinking out loud.  
  
"What what was like?" Ani asked, looking over at him.  
  
"Back in the Mayan days. Back when nobody could fly."  
  
Ani smiled then, glancing back at the shadows in the corner, one of which was her skybax, Skimmer. "How do you know they didn't?" she asked. "There were so many stories of people mixed with fantastical creatures.. how do you know the great _quetzalcoatl_ wasn't truly a skybax who took a human partner to fly the skies with?"  
  
Kaak shook his head doubtfully. "It's possible... but, no. I doubt it."  
  
"Why?" Ani felt the sudden desire to jump to the defense of her theory.  
  
"Because," Kaak said patiently. "They worshipped a great feathery serpent, not a skybax."  
  
"Legends are merely extensions of the truth," Ani replied. "And I know at least one skybax present considers himself a God, so you never know.."  
  
She waved a hand at Skimmer, who warbled proudly. Laughing, Kaak shook his head and leaned back to stare up at the rapidly-increasing darkness. He couldn't imagine not being able to fly, and he couldn't understand how any of his ancestors had managed to do without it.  
  
-  
  
Darkness was rapidly sweeping over the village and off to their left, both Kaak and Ani could see the flickering lights of the bonfires being lit. Still, they waited, until they saw the two skybaxes gliding in through the darkness, riders on their backs, wearing traditional clothes.  
  
"Time to go?" Kaak asked, getting to his feet. Ani nodded.  
  
"There are changing rooms here," she suggested. "It's time to get ready for the ceremonies."  
  
Just as the two apprentices turned to go, they saw Altanden and Skimmer shuffling forward out of the darkness. Both skybaxes wore no saddles, and they wouldn't wear one until the next morning, when the return to the 'normal' world took place.  
  
-  
  
Ysalane and Maypaw joined a trio of Maiasaura walking up the path from the lake to the centerof the village where the bonfires were being lit. As they got closer, the shadows of two skybaxes crossed over them, and a few minutes later, another pair followed.   
  
Ysalane smiled at the sight of her great grandson's skybax backwinging to the ground, and nodded proudly at the way he dismounted and took Altanden's beak in his hands, whispering to the 'bax, no doubt thanking his nestfriend for just being there.  
  
Everyone around the bonfires and the altars was wearing distinctively non-uniform clothing. All of it was homemade by the wearer, though some of the children that ran about happily had needed the help of their parents. Still, the thought was there, and as Ysalane set eyes on the shrine she had helped build in the earlier hours of the morning to her mother, she felt strangely at peace.   
  
Her little shrine wasn't the only one with her mother's face and oviraptor nestfriend drawn in pencils or painted in watercolor on the front of it. Others had remembered, too, and that was what mattered on this day for the ancestors. 


End file.
